They do not play much of a role in jumps. In sprints, however, they may play an important role. They allow you to bring the front knee higher faster and are conducive for a faster turnover rate, due to this. There was a study done that compared Asafa Powell to a Japanese sprinter who ran 10.0 for the 100m. Asafa Powell's hip flexors (I do not remember if the study made a distinction between the different hip flexors, nor can I find the study again) were far larger than the Japanese sprinters, this is not enough to say that they make a huge difference, but does seem to point to them as having some role in sprint speed.
A common recommendation for building the hip flexors for sprinting specifically is to do high knees and B skips (search these on youtube) while maintaining correct posture. Decline situps can be useful as well. Decline situp isos with the body more or less parallel to the ground are effective for building the hip flexors in a stretched position: most people's hip flexors are weak in this position due to hours of sitting.
He probably just did not think he would have to push very hard to get ahead, so got a poor start, and once he saw Gay in front of him he tensed up, preventing him from attaining his famous top speed.
Complacency, methinks.
I do not think it could be due to poor training. Many other sprinters from his camp are hitting major PBs.
i did not say poor training..if you were to train super hard, and come off of an injury..then you would not be at 100% i think he is training hard, to bring him up to a level even better than before. so he is gonna train for peak performance for next year
that is what i thought he is doing
My post was not a response to yours.
I do, however, want to point out that at Bolt's level there is more to getting results than training hard.
He probably just did not think he would have to push very hard to get ahead, so got a poor start, and once he saw Gay in front of him he tensed up, preventing him from attaining his famous top speed.
Complacency, methinks.
I do not think it could be due to poor training. Many other sprinters from his camp are hitting major PBs.
Went to practice today. Threw around some, ran a couple drills. Didn't cleat up. At the end did a little light sprinting + pushups and situps workout with a few of my teammates. Ankle felt okay.
the craziest thing is that they are grabbing rocks with a jump, putting full faith that it will hold their weight and they will catch and hold it...all without a safety rope, seriously you gotta be nuts
Ironically the guy in the video LBSS posted, Dan Osman, died when climbing WITH a rope.